


Breaking Point

by Metronomeblue



Series: imagine me & you- forever [5]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, F/M, Forgiveness, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Hollowfication, Injury Recovery, Loss of Control, M/M, Major Character Injury, Miscommunication, Scars, maybe will have a sequel?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-08
Updated: 2018-01-08
Packaged: 2019-03-02 10:46:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13316496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metronomeblue/pseuds/Metronomeblue
Summary: Shinji loses his hold on his hollow, and his s/o pays some of the price.





	Breaking Point

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired greatly by this: https://bleachedheadcanons.tumblr.com/post/165871937315/angsty-ask-how-would-kensei-ichigo-and-shinji

You woke up that morning to find he’d left without you. That was normal. That was fine. Shinji took his duties seriously, even if literally everything else was a joke. There was a note on the pillow where his head used to be.

_Darling-_

_Gotta go. Weird mission. Be back later._

_Love you,_

_Shinji_

It made you smile. You got ready as you normally did. Brush your teeth, brush your hair, shove a few rice balls into your pocket for later. You made it to the division early, and you were cheered. The first winds of spring had begun, and they carried the scent of dandelions and cherry blossoms. The sky was blue and wide, the sun shone down on you with a blazing intensity. Coming to the door to the offices, the sound of conversation and laughter lit a small warmth in your chest. Your smile grew. Working at the Ninth was a trial sometimes, but sometimes… sometimes it was the best thing in the world. You opened the door and barely managed to avoid a stapler to the face. You laughed.

The world was at the right angle. Just for a little while, everything was good.

Mashiro threw a tape dispenser at Hisagi, who made a sound of mock outrage and dove under a desk.

“What are you doing?” You asked gleefully.

“Dying, mostly,” Hisagi panted, flopping backwards into the floor. “I give up!” He yelled to Mashiro. An ink block hit the side of his leg. “Can you even hear me?” He called.

“Yeah,” she hummed, tossing a pen at his face. “I can hear you just fine.”

“Enough, please,” you laughed, snatching it out of the air. “We should clean up. How did you even get into this?” You asked, sweeping what seemed like an entire box of staples out from under your desk.

“Lieutenant Kuna wanted to see if we could stand up against a visored,” Hisagi grimaced. “Apparently they fight with office supplies.”

“Enlightening,” you snorted.

You spent the next ten minutes cleaning up, and then you sat, ready to finally (finally) start your actual work.

“(Y/n)!” Hisagi called, tossing you a tangle of string. “You’ve got good fingers. Untangle that.”

“Yes, Lieutenant,” you snarked, and he shot you a half-smile.

“They’re just pissy because Shinji had to leave early this morning,” Mashiro said from her position atop Hisagi’s desk. “No love for them!”

“Yes, Lieutenant,” you agreed with a straight face. “That’s exactly it. It has nothing to do with the office supply attacks.” The door slammed open.

“Mashiro!” Your captain yelled, striding quickly across the floor. “The fuck are you doing? Get to work.”

“What about them?” She complained, even as she stood and began to follow him. “We were all just talking, but you’re only gonna come after me?” She pouted, and he rolled his eyes, pointing to the box of weaponized office supplies.

“Yeah, cause _you_  do this shit all the time.” He huffed, swinging open the door to his office and pushing her through. “You have to start taking this seriously.”

“Why?” She snorted. “We all know this is temporary.” Even through the closing door, her voice echoed. “One day, something is gonna happen, and either we’ll be blamed for it or it’ll be our fault, and we’ll be exiled or executed again.”

The words sent a foreboding chill down your spine. Was that why she was so carefree? Because she thought it wouldn’t matter what she did, they’d execute her anyway? Did Shinji think that, too? Was he just biding his time until someone made him leave? Trying to get the most out of every moment because he knew they’d come to an end soon? Something clenched painfully in your chest.

You wished he’d woken you before he left this morning. You wished you could’ve kissed him goodbye.

“(Y/n)?” Hisagi asked, and you realized you’d been standing, watching the closed door with tangled thread in your hands.

“Sorry, Lieutenant,” you said, returning to your work. “Just thinking.”

“Yeah, all right.” He watched you for a moment, too, before turning away. “Long as you’re okay.”

The conversation haunted you for a few hours, until your captain left his office to go on patrol.

“Mashiro- get something done. Hisagi- you know what’s needed by the end of the day?”

“Yes, Captain,” he nodded, returning to his work. Satisfied, your captain swept out of the office to meet the group waiting in the yard.

“What is needed by the end of the day?” You asked, and Hisagi tossed you a roll of papers.

“Layout. You want to add something?”

“Hmm,” you hummed, flicking through. “Nah. It looks good.”

“Then you’re doing requisitions,” he said with a small smirk.

“Ass,” you muttered, sighing. You pulled out your chair, ready to sit and work for another few hours. There was a vague hope of being home on time, maybe making dinner before Shinji got home, maybe even seeing him a little longer before bed.

You were halfway to sitting when the chaos began.

“All hands!” The screams came, the drums letting loose a low, ominous heartbeat.

“What’s happening?” Hisagi demanded, striding out onto the walkway.

“One of the visored,” an unseated you didn’t know called as he ran past. “One of those captains. Two patrols were attacked and somehow one of those monsters finally lost control.” You wanted to strangle him. You wanted to cry. What if it was Shinji? Oh, god, what if it was Shinji?

“Get your sword,” Hisagi called over his shoulder, already dropping his hand to Kazeshini’s hilt. “We’re headed to west Second.”

You ran home with a burst of speed and fear. What if you didn’t make it in time? What if something happened before you got there?  _What if, what if, what if?_ You flung open the door, strode to the side of your bed where your sword rested.

Your fingers fumbled on the stretch of fabric tied to your sheath, your breaths skipped over and over, and you grew more and more frustrated with yourself, letting out a strangled scream of frustration. All this incompetence in you while someone- maybe Shinji- needed your help.

Finally, you were ready.

The journey passed in a blur, a rush of  _Shinji Shinji Captain Muguruma Captain Otoribashi Shinji Shinji Shinji._

“Lieutenant!” You called, sprinting down the path to where Hisagi was standing. There was a noise, a noise like the shattering of glass, the wailing of a person being torn apart. Your breath caught in your chest. “Lieutenant, who is it?” You made to walk past him, but he caught you by your shoulders, held you fast. “Let me go!” You struggled against him.

You could hear that unearthly screeching, the wailing, echoing cry of the hollow. It sent a sick feeling to your stomach like nails on a chalkboard. It scraped uncomfortably against your very soul.

“Who is it?” You demanded of Hisagi, trying to push past him. His hands locked around your elbows. “Lieutenant, who is it? Is it the Captain?” _Is it Shinji?_  echoed between the two of you, and the grimace on his face deepened.

“Listen, (y/n), the Captain’s doing his best, but you can’t go out there, you kn-” the moment you saw it in his eyes, you knew.  _Shinji. Shinji,_ you thought, his name the only thing rattling around between the cold panic and the sick fear in your head, your stomach, pulling at your chest. _Shinji._  You shoved Hisagi away from you, and ducked under his arm when he turned to reach for you.

There was a clearing ahead, maybe five minutes if you ran full speed. You used to use it as a training ground. Thoughts crashed and collided in your head, splinters of feeling and incoherent processing. The ground was hard and the wind was punishing, buffeting you with each step, but you ran on. When you reached the clearing, you crashed through the trees with a gasp and a quick breath. You could feel ice-hot blood dripping down your cheek, oozing from scratches on your arms and legs.

 _Shinji._ The mask you’d never seen before stretched hard and chillingly pale over his face, hiding everything but his eyes. The white had spread down around his throat, long white ribbons twisting around his arms, covering his chest, trailing behind him like a cape, like smoke. The shrieking, snarling noise that was issuing from his covered mouth intensified as Kensei swung a punch at him. Shinji- or the hollow that had taken over his body- caught it in one hand, swinging Kensei away from him like he weighed nothing.

“Goddammit,” Kensei snarled, rising from where he’d been thrown back into a tree. “Shinji, get your fucking head on straight. Wake up!” His left hand hung at a strange, unnatural angle, loose and immovable. He leaned weakly against the tree, and Shinji growled. Charged. Your heart pounded, your legs froze beneath you, your breath came faster, shallower. Your lover was headed straight for your Captain, no trace of his usual abrasive kindness, his careless grace. It was as if he was gone entirely, and the weary way Kensei looked at him you knew he wouldn’t get his hands up in time. You drew your sword and dove across the clearing in one move, coming up between the two visored. Shinji’s hands wrapped around your blade, long, sharp claws the color of green copper inches from your eyes, pushing toward you.

“(Y/l/n)!” Your captain shouted behind you. “You need to leave!” You grit your teeth, doing your best to push Shinji-  _the hollow’_ s long claws away from your blade and your face. He snapped at you, and you managed to push him off, annoying him enough that he went across the clearing to sniff at the bodies of two unseated officers. It twinged in your heart, the way he moved like he didn’t even know his own body. You took advantage of the respite.

“All due respect, Captain, you don’t look like you’re doing so well yourself.” You panted, springing back to stand beside him. “How did you do it last time?”

“Do what?” He asked, snapping his wrist back in place with a frankly disgusting noise.

“Stopped him. When you were all first hollowfied. How did you stop him?”

“I didn’t.” You looked at him, just a glance, but enough to see the pain in his face. “Last time I was the first to turn. I hurt so many people before they found me. Not least of which were the others.” His grimace deepened.

“So it’s the blind leading the blind?” You laughed, because if you didn’t you might cry.

“I’m not leading anyone,” he began, drawing his blade. “You best get your ass out of here, (y/l/n), or he’ll never forgive me.”

“If I go, I’ll never forgive myself,” you told him, forcing your hands to steady.

“Fucking hell,” he muttered, rotating his newly-fixed wrist. “You have a plan?”

“Sort of?” You stepped out into the clearing again, drawing the hollow’s gaze. “Shinji?” You asked, walking slowly, evenly towards him.

The hollow paused, tilting its head at you, those eerie white ribbons blowing in the wind, crackling with blood-red energy. It took a step towards you.

“(Y/l/n)!” Your captain shouted, but you held up a hand toward him, eyes fixed on the mask. The hollow had paused again, looking you up and down with a strange stillness.

“Shinji, do you… recognize me?” The hollow shivered a little, moving forward.

“(y/l/n)!” Captain Muguruma yelled again, but stayed his distance. You ignored him.

“Shinji?” You asked with a trembling voice, reaching out one hand. Slowly, gently, you extended an arm into his space. He watched you curiously, those dark pools where he used to have eyes trained on your hand, shaking in the space between you. _Please_ , you thought, _please. Come back to me_.

“Captain!” A call came up behind you, and you had a brief moment of exasperation before the hollow looked at you, dead in the eye, and attacked. His eyes were pitch black, molten darkness encircling a bright, intent gold. Inhuman and unfathomable, fixed on yours as if he could find something in them to sate his gnawing hunger. Those eyes were so different. They looked nothing like the fierce, self-possessed brown that brought such warmth to your chest, those smiling eyes full of intelligence and awareness. Gone. Replaced with wet black and burning gold. The hollow’s eyes widened at the noise, then contracted, and you had half a breath to prepare for the blinding agony in your arm when those razor-sharp claws came down on you. They dragged across your face, blood covering your eye, sank into your arm.

There was a flash of white-hot pain, a splash of crimson and a dull aching whine in your muscle, your bone. You stumbled back, crying out. You fell to the ground, arms in front of your face as if to protect you. There was a sharp flinch back from the hollow, and Kensei was between you in a second, knife pressed up between the hollow’s claws.

“Go,” he urged, more sorrow in his voice than ever. “ _Please_ , (y/n).” The unseated officer who’d startled him was standing frozen by a tree. The hollow screamed again, thrashing and striking at your captain. You felt your heart skip a beat. Blood trickled into your eyes, and you had to wipe it away.

You went.

You got to your feet, stumbling from the pain and the blood in your eyes and the blood loss in general. You took a step back, but you couldn’t tear your eyes from Shinji, panting and growling and wet with your blood. You felt as if your heart was being torn in two, a vast wound splitting your chest.

“Please don’t hurt him,” you asked softly, and Kensei nodded.

“Last resort, okay?”

“Okay,” you agreed, your voice cracked and thin with exhaustion. It seemed like only moments ago everything was fine. Only moments ago, everything was steady. But now, the world was tilting, speeding towards you, smashing you against the ground. The unseated officer grabbed your arm, but you were still so focused on Shinji you barely noticed. He pulled you back, and you let him. You didn’t turn, didn’t look away from the chalk-white mask, the glittering black eyes and red lightning pricking tears in your eyes. The blood around your eye was beginning to dry, the still-bleeding wounds stinging as your hair was blown into them.

Still, you watched, your eyes fixed on him until you could see him no longer. Then, and only then did you turn, allowing the unseated officer take you to the Fourth.

“Third seat (y/l/n),” a warm, soft voice said. You looked up to find Captain Unohana smiling down at you. There was something so reassuring, so kind about her that you almost broke into tears at the sight of her. She seemed to notice, because the next thing she said was, “Isane, if you would?” Lieutenant Kotetsu nodded, ushering out the officer and closing the curtains behind her.

“I heard one of our captains lost control. Was it Captain Muguruma or Captain Hirako?” She asked it so calmly you could almost answer without hurting.

“It was Shinji,” you replied, your voice cracking and rasping. She raised an eyebrow, then seemed to take in the wounds on your face and arm. The blood, the deep, painful wounds. The emptiness in your eyes. Her face seemed to contract almost, to deepen with anger and sadness. Whatever it was, it was gone quickly.

“How awful,” she murmured. “I’m sure you’re feeling upset. Would you like to discuss it, (y/n)?”

You shook your head, swallowing a thick knot of sorrow. She nodded in return, beginning to clean and bandage your wounds. She made no effort to use kido, and when she noticed your questioning look, she sighed.

“These are no ordinary scratches, (y/n). They heal better without interference. But they will scar,” Captain Unohana warned you, her fingers very gentle on your face as she pressed fresh gauze to your forehead and eye. “All of these wounds will scar.”

“Okay,” you agreed numbly. She looked at you again, really looked, then nodded.

“Just get some rest for now,” she told you. You agreed. When she left, you stood on the very edge of the door, just behind it, listening to the whole Fourth division scurry back and forth, waiting for the outcry when they would inevitably bring Shinji in. Dead or alive, you asked yourself. Will he be dead or alive?

He was alive. Stabs of relief and grief snapped through you simultaneously.

“The end of the hall,” you heard Captain Unohana command. “Guarded and locked.”

You went back to the bed and lay down, mind still blank. You didn’t have to think, didn’t have to plan. You knew what you were going to do. You slept blissfully through the rest of the day, then woke close to midnight.

You crept out of your bed in the darkness, made your way to the locked, guarded room where Shinji was sleeping. One of the black-clad guards (trained by Soi Fon, paranoid and sharp) stopped you before you even reached for the door.

“Are you-?” You nodded. They narrowed their eyes, considering. They looked at your bare feet and hospital-issue yukata, the long scratches over your face, your dark-circled eyes and bandaged arm. A pause, long and considering. A sigh. “Go on. But don’t wake him up.”

You had no intention of waking him up.

You crept into the room, sliding open the door slowly and quietly, the soft pad of your footsteps near silent on the cold floor. The room was almost empty, the bed, the table, and the two chairs beside it the only furniture. You didn’t look at his face because you couldn’t. Once you saw his face it would be over. You looked at the moonlight dappling the floor, striping the walls. You looked at the darkness gathered in the corners. You sat in one of the uncomfortable, hardwood chairs. You looked at his hands, loose and curled, laying over the sheets on the bed, still and pale like you’d never seen them before. You knew if you touched them they would be cold. They would be soft on the backs, calloused and worn on the inside. Familiar and gentle and firm on your skin, carding through your hair, tight on your waist, your ribs, between your legs. A gentle touch on your shoulder, the slightest curl against your back, a knuckle on your cheek.

You reached out, your touch aching for his, but just before your fingers reached him you pulled back. You didn’t want to wake him. You inhaled sharply, grit your teeth.

You looked at his face.

His face was his own. The mask was gone, shattered, they’d told you. He looked peaceful, sweet in sleep, mouth still and small, eyes folded shut but not clenched. He looked calm. He looked like himself, and your fingers itched to set to skin, to trace the lines of the muscles in his face, the curve of his mouth and the expanse of his brow. He looked happy. Like he had no idea what he’d done. He probably didn’t. The hollow took over when he had blacked out, after all. You hoped nobody told him. It was a foolish hope, they would, of course they would, how could they not? But you knew the moment they did you’d lose him forever, and you didn’t think you could bear that.

You knew you couldn’t.

You saw the peace in his face and knew it would die.

 _“One day, something’s going to happen,”_  Mashiro’s voice echoed in your head.

Something had happened, and now the most you could do was wait it out. You stood, tired and sad and afraid, and knowing there was nothing you could do about it. You went back to your room, as silently and easily as you had left it. The guards didn’t even stop you on your way out.

You woke to the sound of arguing. It would almost make you smile if you didn’t know what was coming.

“What do you mean, she’s in there? Why the hell is she in there? No, I don’t-” Shinji’s voice, agitated and frustrated, rose above the rest, and you could hear others- probably the guards- telling him to go back to his room. You slid the door open a crack, unnoticed by the knot of struggling guards trying fruitlessly to bring Shinji back to his room. You did crack a half-smile when you saw him, frowning and glorious in the morning light. All gold hair and contrariness, even in a hospital-issued yukata that did nothing for his dignity. “Listen, (y/n) is my- You can’t just keep me out here! I was knocked fuckin stupid yesterday, probably almost killed a bunch of people I like. I’m hoping for good news, and I wake up to hear they’re in here? You have to let me through-” When three of them had Shinji in a decent hold, you spoke.

“Stop it,” you said flatly. “He just wants to know what happened.” He stopped struggling at the sound of your voice, trying to twist around to see you. Your heart rose in your throat. He didn’t know. They hadn’t told him, and he didn’t know. But hell, he was Shinji. If he didn’t know as soon as he saw you, he’d have to be an imposter.

“See? Just ‘cause I almost killed a few people, you’d think I was a criminal or something,” he said, but there was no humor in his voice. The guards sighed and stepped back at a nod from Unohana, and in the silence, Shinji turned to look at you. His trademark grin flashed for a moment before his eyes latched onto the bandages on your face, your arm. The wary way you stood apart from him. The smile disappeared. The understanding that flooded his face was terrible to watch.

“No,” he said, swallowing. “No,  _not_ you.” He stepped back, horror and guilt twisting his face. “No.”

“Shinji,” you began, reaching out. His face crumpled even more, and his hand went to his mouth. You remembered too late which arm he’d clawed open the day before. The bandages were just another damning piece of evidence.

“No,” he pleaded, to you or himself or one of the guards you couldn’t say. “ _No_.” He turned on his heel and damn near ran away.

You locked yourself in your room.

The echo of brown eyes and burning gold broke into your heart again and again. The twist of agony, of deep-rooted guilt in his face when he saw you. The scars forming over your eye were a chink in your armor. The pain in your arm a crack his face could slip through, a weak spot with which he could haunt you. You were so hurt. Hurt by his loss of control, hurt on his behalf, hurt by his hurting you.

But hurt mostly because he was staying away from you.

You didn’t want him distant and self-loathing, sharp and cold and hollow. You wanted him the way you had had him before, those slim, warm fingers tangled in your hair, that wide Cheshire grin pressed to your mouth, the heat of his body along the lines of yours, the sound of his voice like the scrape of stone and flow of honey in the air all around you. You hurt to be without him.

And you couldn’t make him come  _back._

You knew he loved you as much as you loved him. You knew he’d never shown you the hollow for a reason, never pulled the mask from air to show you the face of his monster. You had never asked him to, because to ask would be to draw a line, and that was a line he would not cross. Would never cross. It wasn’t a part of himself he loved, or even liked. The hollow was a mistake, one bad decision burned into him for all time. It was the darkest piece of him, ice-cold and vicious and loveless. And it had snapped out of him and bitten every part of his life.

His Division, his friends, his self-control.

You.

You’d be lucky if you ever saw him again. Knowing him, Shinji would take all of his things from the home you shared and move back into the Captain’s quarters on the second floor. He’d avoid you, ignore you, lock you out because it was  _safer_  that way. And he wasn’t wrong. There was a part of you that trembled at the thought of seeing him again, imagined in terrible detail how easily the hollow would kill you. How devastated he’d be to wake again with your blood on his hands and your heart on his tongue. How quickly he’d destroy himself for it. There was a part of you that feared him, feared for him, wanted him to leave you alone.

There was a lot of you that wanted him to come back to you and never leave again.

That night, Shinji crept into your room. Soft steps across the worn floor of a hospital room, bare of everything but a bed and a table and two hardwood chairs. The moonlight washed your face in blue and silver, and he sighed, slumping into one of them. He watched you sleep, watching the soft rise and fall of your chest, the beating of your heart that he had been moments away from stopping. And it was a cold, terrifying thought, how close he’d come to never seeing that again. How close he’d come to killing you. Shinji wasn’t an idiot. He’d always known there was a risk of your getting hurt, but it was one thing to plan for potentialities and another to see deep claw marks on your face, your arm, still wet with blood and thick with budding scar tissue and knowing  _he_  was the one to put them there.

Knowing he had done the things he’d  _sworn_  he never would. He’d sworn, the night he kissed you in the pitch black of midnight on a new moon, that he’d never hurt you. He’d never see you afraid of him. He’d never see your blood on his hands.

He looked down at your face, and brushed a lock of hair from your eyes, fingertips grazing the gauze taped lightly to your cheek. He watched you, watched the calm set of your face, the gentle hum of your breathing, the small smile on your mouth. The scars on your forehead, your cheek, your eye.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, trailing his fingers down the forming scars on your face. They were the same space apart as his fingers, and he felt bile rise in his throat. “I’m sorry, (y/n).” He pressed a kiss to your forehead, gentle and light as the brush of his hand on yours.

He left in the darkness.

You woke that morning to find he’d left without you.


End file.
